For more than 21 years, Ireland’s Direct Provision system has been a human rights scandal. Direct Provision has failed utterly to fulfil Ireland’s human rights obligations to people seeking protection here. Instead, it has been 21 years of people being hurt and marginalised, and 21 years of lives put on hold.
We are at a critical moment. The current Government’s commitments to finally end Direct Provision are welcome. But we still have a long way to go to ensure it delivers on these commitments. Direct Provision has to be fully and finally ended, and the proposed alternative must protect people’s human rights.
The real test will be how these commitments are implemented, and how people within the system until then have their rights upheld. Direct Provision has continued through more than 21 years of successive governments and, until it ends, thousands of people will remain in a system the Government has admitted is not fit for purpose.
It will take each and every one of us holding the Government to account to make sure Direct Provision finally ends. This is why we need you to join the Pledge to End Direct Provision. The Pledge is a way to show the Government and all politicians that, no matter what happens on the political landscape, we won’t give up until this inhumane system is truly over.